“Why do you think Dad still does it?” Charlie asked, pushing her tray away. “I mean, he’s been there, what? A quarter of a century now?”
Jake raised an eyebrow. “Because he never went to college. Because he’s proud and will never take a dime from either of us. Because he was, by all accounts but most of all his own, a womanizing asshole during his pro years until he met Mom, and by the time they had me, it was too late for him to go back to school. You don’t need me to be telling you any of this.”
“No, I know. I guess I just mean, why hasn’t he ever moved? Ever since Mom died, we don’t have any real ties to the area. Why not try somewhere else? Arizona or Florida? Marin? Mexico, even? It’s not like he has some great life in LA that he would miss so much.”
Jake looked down at his phone and cleared this throat. “I don’t know that places are lining up to hire a sixty-year-old pro with a few years’ experience on the tour forty years ago. One who—I hate to be blunt about it, but let’s call a spade a spade—sleeps with every single woman who shows up for some help with her backhand. Birchwood treats him pretty well, all things considered.”
“I think I just threw up in my mouth.”
Jake rolled his eyes. “He’s a grown man, Charlie.”
“Do you think he’s happy?” Charlie asked. “I mean, I know he’s had every opportunity to get married again and has clearly not chosen that route, but does he like his life?”
Their father had worked around the clock to support them both, to give them every opportunity that their far more privileged classmates had enjoyed: summer camp, music lessons, annual camping trips to national parks. And of course the tennis lessons. He’d taught them both to play from the time they were four. Jake soon lost interest, and Mr. Silver never pushed him. Charlie, on the other hand, was a natural: she loved her tiny pink racket, the running and balancing drills, the tube she used to help pick up balls. She loved filling those little paper cone cups with icy water from the Gatorade cooler and scraping the clay off her sneakers with the floor-mounted rolling brush and the way the tennis balls smelled when she cracked open a brand-new can. But most of all she loved her father’s undivided attention, how he focused entirely on her and his face lit up every time she flounced onto the court with her ponytail braid and purple striped sweatpants. The look that was usually reserved for whatever woman he was dating at the time, a seemingly endless cadre of middle-aged divorcées stuffed into too-tight and too-short dresses, who would hang on his arm and offer Charlie insincere compliments about her bedroom or her braids or her nightgown before following her father into the night in a cloud of potent perfume.
Not that they were all like that. Sometimes the women were younger, not yet mothers themselves, and they would talk to Charlie and Jake in high-pitched voices like they were zoo animals, or bring them thoughtful but age-inappropriate gifts: a stuffed koala bear for Charlie when she was fifteen; a Heineken beer cozy for a seventeen-year-old Jake. There were women Mr. Silver met at the club, women he met at the Fish Shack down on Malibu Beach where he’d been going for twenty years and knew everybody, women who were just passing through Los Angeles on their way from New York to Hawaii or San Francisco to San Diego, and who somehow, someway, always found their way to the Silver house. Charlie’s dad never expected his kids to offer anything more than a friendly hello over French toast in the morning, but he also never seemed to consider that it wasn’t the healthiest of examples to march an ever-changing parade of one-night stands through family breakfast. A handful of them stuck around for a few weeks—Charlie had the most vivid memories of a very kind, exceedingly skinny woman named Ingrid who seemed genuinely interested in both Silver kids—but mostly they vanished quickly.
Tennis was when Mr. Silver focused entirely on Charlie. It was the only time he wasn’t working, or fishing, or acting enamored with his latest lady interest, as he liked to call them. When they walked out onto the court at Birchwood—almost always at night under the lights, when the paying members were home with their families—Mr. Silver’s attention narrowed to a laser beam of light that warmed Charlie the instant it focused on her. It was the one thing that hadn’t changed after her mother died, the obvious delight he took in teaching Charlie the game he loved. All those years had been a labor of love for him, from the time she’d followed him like a duckling around the court as he demonstrated the baseline, the alleys, the service line, and no-man’s-land, to the very first time Charlie took a game off him fair and square when she was thirteen and Mr. Silver whooped so loudly a groundskeeper came to make sure they were okay. Nothing got in the way of their lessons: not Charlie’s mother’s death nor the women who kept him company in the years that followed. He taught Charlie everything she knew—strokes, footwork, strategy, and of course, sportsmanship—straight up until she won the sixteen-and-under Orange Bowl at age fifteen, the Grand Slam of junior tournaments, and Mr. Silver insisted he’d taken her as far as he could.
Jake stretched his arms overhead in the chair beside her and let out a loud exhale. “Like his life?” He rubbed his chin with his forefinger and thumb. “I think so. He’s slowing down at work, yes, but not in the love department.”
“The love department?” Charlie reached behind her head to adjust her pillow. “That’s just plain gross.”
“Oh come on, Charlie. Twenty-four is old enough to acknowledge that your father is a man whore. There are worse things.”
“Like what?”
“Like your mother being one.”
Charlie couldn’t help a small smile. “Fair point.”
Her phone pinged. She turned to grab it so quickly from the night table that her foot twisted ever so slightly and pain shot up her leg. You playing new haven? The text read. Marco.
She smiled despite her pain and the fact that no, she was not playing the Connecticut Open—nor the US Open, nor any of the Asian tournaments in the rest of the summer and fall. She’d be lucky if she were ready for Australia in the new year.
Hey! Just out of surgery. Rehab to follow. Fingers crossed for australia january . . .
Pobrecita! Sorry, bella. u ok?
“You got a guy you’re not telling me about?” Jake asked, looking suddenly interested.
Thanks! Good luck in cincy. Miss you! she pecked out with her thumbs and then regretted the moment she hit “send.” Miss you? She didn’t even realize she was holding her breath, willing him to text back, until Jake spoke again.
“Hello? Charlie? Seriously, ease up on the phone a little, you look like you might crush it.”
She relaxed her grip. Still nothing.
“Wanna watch something? I brought the cable to hook up my iPad to the room TV, so we can watch a Shark Tank if you want?”
Another ping. This one had only two letters, the only ones that mattered: xo
Charlie put aside her phone and, unable to wipe the grin off her face, said, “That sounds great. Cue it up.”
• • •
“Come on, Charlie. One more! You’re not such a complete pussy that you can’t do one more, are you?” Ramona screamed. No one else in the rehab gym even blinked.
Charlie was lying prone in a leg-press machine, but she couldn’t bring herself to push against the weight bar with only her injured right foot, as Ramona had requested. Instead, she cradled her broken wrist against her chest and used her healthy foot to assist the injured one. Ramona swatted away her left leg. “Trust it!” she yelled. “The Achilles’ has been fixed, but you’re never going to strengthen it if you don’t fucking trust it!”
“I’m trying, I swear I am,” Charlie breathed through gritted teeth.
Ramona smiled and slapped a meaty, masculine hand on her own tree-trunk thigh. “Well, try harder!”
Charlie smiled despite her pain. Ramona and her filthy mouth were the only redeeming parts of what was starting to feel like endless physical therapy. She completed three more just
to prove she was tough before collapsing in a heap on the blue mat.
“Good. You actually did decent work today.” Ramona gave Charlie a playful kick. “Same time, same place, tomorrow. Bring your A-game,” she called over her shoulder as she headed to her next client, a Lakers player who was rehabbing a shoulder injury.
“Can’t wait,” Charlie muttered as she pulled herself to standing.
“Great work today,” Marcy said, as she followed Charlie to the locker room. “You’re really showing huge improvement only five weeks in.”
“You think? It feels like it’s taking forever.” Charlie stripped off her sweaty shorts and T-shirt and wrapped a towel under her arms.
Marcy led the way to the hot tub and took a seat on the bench while Charlie gingerly lowered herself into the steaming water.
“You’re doing it exactly right and according to schedule. It’s no small thing to come back from a shattered Achilles’ and a fractured wrist in six months. Really five if you count the training you’ll need for the Australian Open in January. Most regular civilians would have trouble with it, not to mention a professional athlete who needs to compete at elite levels. Patience is key here.”
Charlie leaned her head back. Eyes closed, she flexed her feet to allow the Achilles’ to stretch in the heat. It ached, but the shooting pain to which she’d grown accustomed immediately after surgery was thankfully gone. “I can barely imagine walking without limping again. How am I going to jump and turn and lunge on it?”
Marcy’s neat blond ponytail was so thick and precisely tied that it barely moved as she rested her elbows on her knees and peered at Charlie. “Have you considered the possibility that it may take longer? That perhaps Australia isn’t completely realistic?”
Charlie opened her eyes and looked at Marcy. “Frankly? No, I haven’t. Dr. Cohen said it was possible to make a full recovery in six months, and that’s exactly what I plan to do.”
“I hear you, and I respect that, Charlie. I just think it could be wise to talk about a game plan if for whatever reason that doesn’t happen.”
“What’s there to discuss? I’m going to work my ass off and hopefully be ready for Australia in January. If that’s absolutely impossible—like, I’ll damage it even more if I try to play—then of course I’ll have to wait a bit longer. What’s the worst-case scenario? Starting with Indian Wells in February? It’s not ideal, but if I have to do that, I will.”
Marcy was silent. She clasped her hands together.
Charlie made little circles in the water with her right hand while taking care to keep the cast on her left arm dry. She thanked her lucky stars each and every day that it wasn’t her playing arm; all the doctors assured her it wouldn’t affect her backhand. “What are you so nervous about?”
“Nothing, it’s just . . .” Marcy’s voice trailed off as she looked down at the wet tiled floor.
“Spit it out. Seriously, we’ve known each other long enough that you don’t have to mince words. What are you thinking?”
“I’m just wondering . . . It’s my job to consider all the possibilities, to think through any possible complications or unexpected . . . you know.”
Charlie felt a little wave of irritation rise, but she took a deep breath and forced herself to sound neutral. “And?”
“And, well, I think we should at least have a conversation—as hypothetical and unlikely as it is—about what things look like if this injury turns out to be more . . . intractable.”
“You mean if I can’t recover from it?”
“I’m sure you will, Charlie. Dr. Cohen is the best, and he’s certainly seen this before. But of course every person is different, and all bets are off when you’re talking about someone who needs to perform at your level. It’s a lot more complicated.”
“So what are you saying? Because I think I understand, but I can’t quite believe you’re suggesting it.”
It wasn’t so unheard-of that the women argued—they spent more than three hundred days a year together—but it was usually about mundane things: assigned seats on the plane, when to meet for breakfast, whether to watch House Hunters International or Property Brothers. But suddenly this conversation felt fraught with something Charlie couldn’t quite identify.
Marcy held up her hands. “I’m not suggesting anything more than we consider all the possibilities. If you are one of the small but real percentage of athletes who can’t make a full recovery from this very serious injury, I think we need to talk about that.”
“I see.”
“Charlie, don’t be like that. I believe in you. But some things are out of our control.”
“This isn’t one of them,” Charlie said quietly.
“I know you think that, and trust me, no one hopes you’re right more than I, but there is a very real possibility that an injury like this could be . . . lingering.”
“Career-ending. You may as well say it, it’s what you mean.”
“Fine. I will say it then. Career-ending. Now we are both hoping against hope that it’s not true for you—and it probably won’t be—but it is something we should talk about.”
Charlie hoisted herself from the water. Marcy handed her a towel. Charlie didn’t feel the least bit self-conscious about her nudity, even now, even despite their conversation—it was like being naked in front of her own mother. Once again, she wrapped it around herself and sat next to Marcy on the bench.
“I disagree. I really don’t want to talk about it.”
“Okay, but I think—”
“And if we’re being completely honest with each other, I’m upset you’re even considering it.”
Marcy cleared her throat. “It has nothing to do with my opinion of you, or your game, or your ability to overcome this. It’s statistics, Charlie. Nothing more, nothing less. Some people will come back from this, and some won’t.”
“So what’s the alternative?” Charlie asked as she wiped away a sweat rivulet that ran down her forehead. “Give up? Is that what you’re saying?”
“Of course not. We need to see this through. Hopefully everything will be fine.”
“Fine? That’s our big goal? For everything to be fine?” Charlie knew she sounded peevish, but she couldn’t help it. The irritation she’d felt mere minutes before was quickly becoming outright anger.
“Charlie.” Marcy’s voice was quiet and controlled, just like her. Just like Charlie, too, until the dreaded fall at Wimbledon had come along and blown up not just her ankle but her entire life. The last few weeks had been the longest stretch since she was four years old that she hadn’t so much as picked up a racket. Always she had wondered what it would be like to have a break, take a real leave from tennis, live a normal life. Now she knew, and it was awful. Granted, going to rehab and lying on the couch in her father’s house wasn’t exactly like sipping margaritas on a Mexican beach, but Charlie had been astounded to realize how much she missed playing. She was eager to get back. More than eager—desperate—and the last thing on earth she needed to hear was her trusted friend and coach suggesting that maybe tennis wasn’t really in her future. “Marcy, I want to make something very clear here: I will come back from this injury. I will get back into the top ten. I will win a Grand Slam. And I need you to believe that. I’m twenty-four, Marce. Not old, but certainly not getting any younger. If I’m ever going to make it really big, it needs to be now. Not in two years. Not in three. Right this very moment. I’ve worked too hard to give up on myself now, and I hope you won’t either.”
“Of course I’m not giving up on you! No one believes in your potential more than I do. But part of being a professional is being able to have honest and rational conversations about the reality of a situation. That’s all I’m trying to do here.”
“You’re assuming that I’m going to quit over my injury because you did over yours,” Charlie blurted out, and instantly regretted it. Marc
y flinched as though she’d been hit but didn’t lose her composure. “You know that was an entirely different scenario.”
It was Charlie’s turn to be quiet. Was it so different? Marcy had torn her rotator cuff not once but twice. The first time she’d chosen rehab instead of surgery, and the injury hadn’t healed entirely. By the time it happened a second time, it was potentially too late for surgery to do much good. She should have at least tried it—all the doctors thought so—but instead, at age twenty-seven, Marcy had announced her retirement.
“If you say so.”
“If I say so? Charlie, they put my odds of making a full recovery, enough so I could play again, at ten percent. Meanwhile the surgery could possibly have done more damage than good, and the rehab was going to be a year or more. Where exactly was I going with news like that? Not up in the rankings, that’s for sure.”
They’d walked back into the air-conditioned part of the locker room, and Charlie was starting to shiver. She grabbed another towel and draped it over her shoulders before turning and looking Marcy straight in the eye. It felt exhilarating to speak so plainly, so directly—it was something she almost never did. “I need you to push me right now, to tell me that I’m going to come back from this stronger than ever. Not question whether or not I’ll ever play again,” she said softly.
The Singles Game Page 3